If you want a break from beer on St. Patrick’s Day, here are three green cocktails I know are tasty, because I made them up!
Irish Spring Cocktail. Celery, mint, lime, and gin.
Green Tea and Ginger Cocktail. The name says it all.
Basil Mojito. Basil, rum, and lime.
Have a great weekend!
Stuffed vegetables can often go wrong, but I can now vouch that this recipe for Spaghetti Squash Boats is not only delicious, but the cleverest use of spaghetti squash I’ve seen.
Spaghetti squash is a squash that, when cooked, comes apart in ribbons like spaghetti noodles. I don’t normally like it, but putting the sauce and cheese in the center made it into a great meal, and a low calorie one too.
It’s also cheap. I used homemade turkey sausage instead of ground turkey, which brought the price of the dish way down. I estimate I made dinner for two for $2.65.
I’ve harvested the Meyer lemons from my bushes outside. This year I ended up with 5 buckets of lemons.
In the past, I’ve juiced them all and stuck them in the freezer, but I decided this method wasn’t working very well, since I just end up with a lot of old lemon juice taking up space.
So this year, I’m going to make a bunch of food with the lemons. Here are the things I’m making:
What’s your favorite thing to do with lemons?
The Grapefruit Margarita that I made with DIY Cocktails is the perfect solution when you aren’t in the mood for the sugar bomb of a blended strawberry margarita or the sourness of a traditional margarita. The Grapefruit Margarita is sweet, but not too sweet, refreshing, and mellow. I liked it so much, I had two.
Grapefruit Margarita
(Makes one cocktail)
Ingredients:
Directions:
Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker. Add ice and shake thoroughly. Strain the drink into a glass and garnish with a grapefruit slice, if desired. Enjoy!
I curious to try these Guacamole Deviled Eggs. Instead of mayonnaise, they use avocados and Mexican seasoning. They look pretty good. And you know how I am a fan of substituting avocado for mayonnaise.
In November, turkeys were $.58/pound at my local store. That’s cheap for meat these days, so we bought three turkeys: one for Thanksgiving, one for later for the year, and one for sausage.
Last week, I got around to making the sausage. I have made sausage before, but never with poultry I butchered myself.
I ended up with 5 pounds of turkey sausage for $.61/pound. Turkey sausage usually costs between $3.99-$5.99/pound. By making sausage instead of buying it, I’m saving 85%-90%.
The sausage can be used anywhere you would use pork sausage, but with the added benefit of being healthier. We’ve already made a pizza with it and tonight I’m using it with home-grown fennel in a doctored version of this Ziti with Sausage, Onions, and Fennel recipe. Here’s how I did it:
First, I butchered the turkey. Since I was only using the dark meat for the sausage, I took the breast off and baked it for dinner using a version of this Herb-Roasted Turkey Breast recipe. In addition to a meal of sliced turkey with vegetable sides, I also made turkey and dumplings, several turkey paninis, and turkey salads just from the breast alone.
Next I removed all the dark meat from the bone. This took some time. In the end, I had 3 1/2 pounds turkey meat for sausage.
I also put the bones a pot and made Turkey Broth, which I froze for later use.
Because turkey is so lean, I had to add additional pork fat to make the sausage stick together. (Most turkey sausage is not all poultry—always read ingredients.) I asked the butcher at my grocery story for pork fat. They had some in the back, which I bought for $.20. Between that and the turkey fat I pulled off when butchering the turkey, I had a pound of fat for the sausage.
Now all I had to do was run the turkey through a meat grinder. If I wanted to get really fancy, I could also put the sausage in casings, but that’s a different post. Here’s the recipe:
Basil Turkey Sausage
Ingredients:
Mix the seasoning, chopped basil, and wine with the meat.
Get out a frying pan and fry up a bit of the meat. Taste the cooked sausage. Adjust seasoning and repeat as necessary.
When you are happy with how it tastes, run the turkey sausage through the meat grinder one more time.
Divide into half-pound packages, wrap in freezer-safe packages, and freeze accordingly for future use.
So in the end, one turkey yielded turkey broth, multiple turkey dinners, and 5 pounds of sausage. Pretty good!
Following the post on 10 Heart Shaped Foods For Valentine’s Day, here is how to make a Heart Shaped Cake.
Looks like it is a matter of baking two layers of the cake, one in a circular pan the other in a square-shaped pan.
Then you cut the circle in half to make the tops of the heart and put it diagonally on the square and ice.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Here are 10 heart-shaped foods for Valentine’s Day:
For Valentine’s Day this year, DIY Cocktails and I came up with a different kind of cocktail, one that is built around the beet. The Heartbeet Cocktail (get it?), is made with tequila and a pomegranate liqueur. It’s lightly sweet and bright with a slight earthy flavor from the beet. Best of all, it’s a beautiful deep red color, perfect for a romantic holiday.
The Heartbeet Cocktail
(makes one cocktail)
Ingredients:
Direction:
First, juice the beet, either with a juicer or a blender. To juice with a blender, chop the beet up, run on the finest setting, and push through a sieve. (You also just buy beet juice from the store.) Be careful with the juice–it stains.
In a cocktail shaker, combine all liquids over ice and shake thoroughly. Strain into a glass and garnish with a lemon twist.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
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Last year I suggested making Cheesy Mushroom Pull Apart Bread for the Super Bowl. This year, I say go with the Mac and Cheese Cups.
The idea is simple, but brilliant. Make your macaroni and cheese–I have a good recipe–and scoop into muffin tins. Then just cook at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes. You end up with little “cupcakes” of macaroni and cheese that are bound to be a hit.
